IN the end, Towada didn’t come back before we had to leave. Ayako assured us that he was probably just at the library and that since he’d taken his phone with him, she wasn’t worried. Unexpectedly—or maybe expectedly by then—Takanori, who was supposed to be on his way to a New Year’s work party, was designated my escort home.
“Sorry for the trouble,” I said.
“Not at all, not at all. I was hoping for more time to chat.”
I’d tried multiple times to decline but was no match for his brand of radiant charisma. Takanori was famous, handsome, and, in spite of the hat pulled low over his eyes, alluring. I sensed the stares and double-takes from strangers as we walked, their eyes questioning why I accompanied such a figure. God, I just prayed they assumed we were relatives.
“Has Takumi ever spoken to you about his family?” he asked, drawing me out of my mortification.
“Oh, um, just a little.”
“He did, did he? I thought as much. That’s great—that he now has someone to talk to about this kind of stuff.”
“Sorry?”
Not quite catching his words, I glanced up at him. He nodded to himself before the smile on his face faded into a graver demeanor. “You see, I don’t like that father of his. And even if Ayako tolerates the man, I don’t,” he said, reemphasizing his earlier contempt. “Uncle Kaoru—Ayako’s late husband—was classmates with my dad.”
“Um?” I wasn’t quite sure what he intended by saying that. But Ayako had mentioned that she was a lot younger than Kaoru… I attempted a few calculations: Takanori was around thirty, plus he had an older sister. If Kaoru had been classmates with Takanori’s father, that would have put Kaoru in his late fifties, early sixties, if he were still alive. And Ayako was close to my mother’s age, so…
Their age gap was over two decades? That is substantial.
“Ayako was still in college when Uncle Kaoru first brought her around, and she was met with instant disapproval.”
“From Towada’s dad?”
“Mm-hmm. The two brothers’ parents had already passed, so they were each other’s only family. While I get wanting to be protective, he took it a step too far. It’s not cool the way he’s distanced himself for so long and then only initiates contact to complain. It’s like he never even tried to hide his disdain for Ayako. Even as a child, his holier-than-thou attitude really grated on me.”
Takanori explained that Ayako and Kaoru’s journey to marriage was delayed significantly because of the tension between Akira and Kaoru.
“Ayako is like an older sister to me, someone I always looked up to,” Takanori reflected. “She’s the nicest person, so it really upsets me to see someone disparage her without even bothering to genuinely get to know her.” His tone was knife-sharp; he made no effort to conceal his frustration. “Like, do you know how good Ayako and Uncle Kaoru were to each other? They cared so much for each other—to the very end.”
In my mind materialized a moment from Christmas Eve when Ayako dropped the needle on her record player. She’d placed it so delicately, her eyes narrowed in fondness as she gazed at the spinning disk. So much love lingered in the action that even I could tell she cherished him dearly.
“To be loved liked that—what more could we ask for in life?” Takanori regarded the sky wistfully, and in that instant, I thought he didn’t look any older than me. “Takumi’s been coming here since grade school. In the beginning, his mother dropped him off, but it wasn’t very long before he started coming by himself. His father never shows his face around here, so it’s been years since I’ve seen him. Can’t imagine he’s any different, though.”
“He was desperate to ‘fix’ me, taking me to all kinds of doctors—psychiatrists, neurologists, you name it. But when none of that worked, he finally just gave up and left me alone.” Towada’s words from one of our walks replayed in my head.
“And now he’s coming back, eh?” Takanori’s voice reached me from above. “Can’t imagine Takumi’s too happy,” he muttered, seemingly to himself.